Get to know one of our newest additions, Juliette Goddard, Mechanical Design Engineer with IGS. Having initially joined the company in Summer 2020 through the Saltire Scholarship programme, Juliette shares a little about her path to working with IGS.
You first came to IGS as part of the Saltire Scholarship programme – can you tell us a bit about this experience?
In 2020 I was offered a research internship that like many things was cancelled due to the pandemic. Fortunately, I had also successfully got into the Saltire candidate pool and applied for the IGS Strategy internship. I recognised the company name after having had a meeting with a member of the IGS Hardware team six months prior as part of a mentoring program at Heriot-Watt.
I was lucky enough to be offered a nine-week placement in the Strategy team working a value stream project. Being in the more business and customer-oriented side of the company helped me see IGS from a different perspective than if I was working on a more technical engineering project. I enjoyed learning about the vertical farms and how the product would be valued by different customers along its lifecycle.
On the final day of the placement, all the interns based nearby got to go to the site and meet other IGS crew members and each other (after working remotely for nine weeks). This is where I met a number of the engineers and got to see round the plant room at the Crop Research Centre in Invergowrie. Dave Scott [CTO at IGS] and I got chatting about some of the upcoming engineering projects and a month later I started a part-time position in the hardware engineering team on a robotic trolley project!
I thought the Saltire internship was an amazing opportunity and highly recommend IGS as a placement company.
What have been your key learnings from working remotely through the pandemic?
I found that it is best to try and separate your working and living space. Moving my desk to the kitchen made a massive difference to my productivity, as did packing everything away at the end of the day to signal to myself it’s okay to relax now.
Also walks. I have never gone on so many short walks in my life! They really help clear your head and take a break from the screen.
What inspired you to pursue a career as an engineer?
I found engineering to be a way of channelling my creativity and academic strengths in maths and science into a possible future career.
If you could give yourself aged 15 one piece of advice what would it be?
There are so many opportunities available: don’t be scared to say no occasionally in order to prioritise the really exciting projects you want to do.
When COVID-19 restrictions begin to ease, what do you look forward to doing most?
Hopefully celebrating (physically) my graduation this year with family and friends, starting my professional engineering career and maybe even travelling a little.
If you’re interested in a career at IGS and want to find out more about our current vacancies, please visit our website: https://www.intelligentgrowthsolutions.com/careers.
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